Through the month of September, The Spin was sent several interesting submissions of slip-ups within the media and advertising industry from across the globe.
1. A KitKat ad on a digital-out-of-home (DOOH) billboard did the rounds on WhatsApp in the UAE for all the wrong reasons. Turns out, the creative copy for the Vanilla Waffle limited edition flavour in English was ‘waffly good’ but, unfortunately, the Arabic translation was woefully bad. To reiterate the thoughts of many industry experts: Perhaps, it’s time to invest in a local copywriter rather than a global translating tool.
2. When Everlane became ‘ever-lame’. Context: American Eagle Outfitters saw its sales soar and market capitalisation fly high, despite getting trolled for its “Sydney Sweeney has great jeans” ad, which millions of online users thought alluded to eugenics and racial discrimination, specifically the idea of those with superior genetic traits looking great. Within weeks of the global controversy, several other jeans brands such as Gap flipped the script by making it a point to highlight racial diversity within their ads. However, not every jeans brand that jumped on the moving diversity and inclusion bandwagon got it right. For instance, The Spin received an email with a subject line that read: ‘Everlane or Ever-lame?’ Clearly, the copy on this Everlane advertisement didn’t resonate with working women.
3. Speaking about creative copy on an advertisement, maybe it’s not as simple as writing a catchy one-liner. Maybe, we do need to break these silos that exist between the strategy, creative design and copywriting departments. Else, we get ads that in their final ‘approved’ iteration read ‘My Perfect Pet. Gently Cooked’. Yes, the intention of the ad is clear, but the way it reads on a passing delivery truck is comical.
4. Someone saw a pack of four ‘unbeatably soft bread’ Smucker’s Uncrustables thaw-and-eat sandwiches and decided to send The Spin a photograph of the box it was sold in. ‘The Fright in Every Bite’ slogan on the box, coupled with the illustration of a spider, left it gathering cobwebs on the shelf. Lesson: It’s probably best not to leave that much to the imagination on a consumer packaged goods product.
5. The Spin also received a photograph of a lengthy Heinz ad placed in the London Underground. While at first glance, the mistake is not obvious, a closer look reveals that the AI-generated advertisement has ‘football fans’ sporting jerseys with seemingly different logos of the teams they collectively support and seem to be cheering for. Also, surely, they can’t be that happy sitting on a sofa that doesn’t seem to have enough room for all of them. Well, who are we to comment on how ‘ridiculously good’ Heinz pasta can reshape reality?
6. British television channel GB News made the tiny village of Lanchester in County Durham, England, quite famous overnight by misspelling the Duchy of Lancaster as the Duchy of Lanchester. Yahoo News ran the story with a headline stating, “TV typo sees County Durham village ‘get its own cabinet job’” before it was taken down. Looks like the mistake has now been immortalised for the good folk of Lanchester, who enjoyed their 30 seconds of fame.
